Thanks a lot to the awesome Dina, who betaed this for me! :)
I completely fell in love with Disturbed's cover of Sounds Of Silence, and it inspired me to write this. I mostly went with the feelings it expressed.
I hope you guys like it, don't hesitate to leave a review with your opinion behind :)
(3800 Words)
Sounds Of Silence
Hello darkness, my old friend
I've come to talk with you again
Because a vision softly creeping
Left its seeds while I was sleeping
And the vision that was planted in my brain
Still remains
Within the sound of silence
Simon & Garfunkel – Sounds Of Silence
Rafael Barba took a few deep breaths, inhaling the cool night air as he walked down the steps of his apartment building, pulling his scarf tighter around his head before burying his hands in the pockets of his jeans. A cold drizzle came down from the black sky, and after briefly stopping under the streetlamp in front of his house, he started to walk down the street.
It was a starless night; darkness engulfed him, only occasionally broken by the light of a billboard or a lamp. However, he didn't care – darkness seemed to be more comfortable for him lately, and at night, he found, it was easier to see things more clearly, the way they really were.
An exhausting insomnia was keeping him awake, and had for weeks now – sadly, this wasn't the first time he left his bed in the middle of the night to wander the streets of Manhattan after deciding that it was pointless to turn over in bed again and again without finding any rest. And so he walked, sometimes even until the morning dawned and dipped the city into a soft, pink glow, but watching the sunrise at the Central Park only distracted him from what was keeping him awake for a very short time.
Whenever he left his bed at night, he knew exactly that nothing would change, and there seemed to be nothing he could do about the thing that was constantly troubling his mind.
If he really tried to fall asleep, he would see them in front of him the moment he dozed off, causing him to wake up again immediately, panting heavily as if he'd just freed himself from a nightmare.
Rafael of course was aware of why he was having such extreme reactions when he was thinking of Olivia being with Tucker. Until all of this had started, he'd only ever heard of what could happen if one suppressed strong feelings for too long, hearing all these information from the psychologists that he'd met during trials. But now, he was experiencing all of this, learning the hard way how it was, and he wished he'd done everything differently in the past.
He'd tried to come to terms with the fact that he hadn't had the courage to tell Olivia what he felt for her, what she meant to him, and that she was now with Tucker. As her friend, all he wanted was for her to be happy, to have a stable relationship with a man that was good for her and also for Noah, but a very selfish part of him kept him from feeling joy for her. It was the broken heart that ached inside his chest whenever he saw her, or thought of her; he simply couldn't feel glad for her. He'd seriously tried, he'd tried to shove his own feelings to the side, but it wasn't working for him. Whenever he tried to see her as just a friend, everything seemed to get worse – the yearning for the days where he'd been able to think that maybe he would be able to tell her about his love for her the next day, the pain, his insomnia.
It was as if he was trapped in a spiral, and he was being pulled downwards.
Rafael thoroughly wished their friendship wouldn't suffer under this, but unfortunately, it did, at least from his perspective. He tried to minimise the time he spent with her during cases, without making it too difficult for them to work together, and they barely ever had their little moments anymore. In the past, they'd often discussed cases over lunch, or had celebrated wins or mourned losses with a tumbler of scotch at his office. Those moments were gone, only bittersweet memories inside his mind.
Being around her wasn't so easy for him anymore; it demanded a lot of strength from him to conceal from her how broken he was inside. He didn't want to trouble her with problems that were entirely his, and he was sure that if she asked him, he wouldn't be able to admit that he was breaking apart because he loved her too much and could barely cope with seeing her being with Tucker. Even though it was the last thing he wanted, he tried to keep her at a distance, for the sake of her happiness, trying to ignore what it was doing to him.
Only sometimes he attempted to grasp for a moment alone with her, when the feeling of missing her was getting too strong, but his timing always seemed to be wrong – maybe that was his curse.
OoO
Olivia stood up from the visitor chair in front of Rafael's desk, briefly throwing a glance at her phone while turning to the door. Rafael looked at the clock hanging at the wall, and an idea shot through his mind, which he immediately voiced before she could reach for the door handle. "Liv, do you want to go and grab something for lunch?"
His heart was racing in his chest, and he hoped that he didn't give her a look that was filled with too much hope and foremost the desperation he was feeling somewhere inside of him. Olivia shuffled, her gaze wandering down to her phone again, then she answered with an apologetic smile: "Uh, sorry, there's a lot of paperwork waiting for me on my desk. Maybe another time."
Disappointment seemed to punch him harder into the stomach than normally, but he tried to appear casual as he shrugged, replying: "Okay... don't work too long, Liv."
"See you at the trial," she said while opening the door, the tiniest of smiles playing around her lips, and he actually thought that he could see regret and a bit of guilt flicker through her brown eyes.
She seemed to hesitate a moment before she closed the door behind her and Rafael ran a hand over his face with a sigh, loosening his blue and white tie with the other one. He struggled to gulp down all the feelings that boiled inside of him, and his legs were feeling wobbly as he stood up from his chair to walk over to the window. It was a sunny day, and outside One Hogan Place, he could see people walking down the street, smiles on their faces.
And then, he spotted a familiar face in the crowd below, his heart immediately clenching. It was Tucker, and moments later, Olivia appeared in his field of vision, hugging the IAB Captain with a bright smile on her face. The moment they kissed, Rafael turned away from the window with a shaky gasp, feeling tears burn in his eyes.
OoO
Somewhere on his walk through the city that never slept, Rafael had picked up two coffees; as he wasn't going to get any sleep unless he took pills, he had to get enough caffeine to still feel fit in the morning. While he sipped the hot beverage and allowed the heat of the cup to seep into his cool hands, he became aware of his surroundings for the very first time. When he walked, he just let his feet carry him wherever they wanted to, and tonight, they'd apparently brought him into the street where Olivia and Noah lived.
Immediately, he stopped dead in his tracks, gulping hard, this definitely wasn't a place he wanted to be at right now, even though he knew that she was most definitely asleep. Standing at the corner, he stared at the building in the distance, remembering the few times he'd been there to visit. How he'd teased her about Noah's toys lying on the floor of her living area was the most prominent one, and he had to shake his head to get rid of it.
There was a voice in the back of his head getting louder; it urged him to take his phone and call her, or to go up and knock at her door... And in the first moment, it seemed like a good idea to tell her what was going on in his mind.
Because what really was torturing him wasn't that she was with Tucker and that he seemed to be making her happy. It was his own silence.
His inability to voice what was going on inside of him was making everything worse, and he didn't really want to stay silent anymore, but he also thought that it would be wrong to tell her. Or was it? He'd actually discussed this with his mother; she was the only person that knew what was really going on with him, and he knew that she was highly worried. She'd begged him to go to a doctor, seeing how his mental state was wearing him out physically, how it drained his strength, but Rafael didn't think that it would help him.
He knew that she just wanted him to feel better, but she hadn't been able to come up with a solution to his misery as well.
OoO
"Rafi, I can't bear to see you like this," Lucia Barba exclaimed as she paced through his living room, her concerned gaze wandering over her son. Rafael knew exactly that he looked like a mess – dark rings under his eyes proved the lack of sleep, his dark hair was sticking into every direction, he was still in his pyjama pants and t-shirt and a half-empty bottle of scotch stood in front of him.
"This has to stop," she added, finally stopping and sinking next to him onto the couch, gently taking his hand. "You need to let her go, Rafi."
He shook his head and looked down at his bare feet, a lump forming in his throat. A tear was rolling down his cheek as he answered, his voice barely audible: "I can't."
Lucia sighed and pulled him into her arms, rocking him like a little child as sobs started to shake his body. "You really love her..."
She didn't question his unwillingness to let Olivia go and try to get rid of all the pain that was holding him in its clutches. Lucia knew her son well enough to know that he wasn't doing this out of sentimentality; Rafael always had reasons for the things he did.
"Maybe you should tell her," she suggested as he slowly calmed down again, carefully wiping his tears away with a tissue, like she'd done countless time during his childhood.
"I don't think it would be right to bother her with my problems. She's... she's happy, I think. It would be selfish to go and make her aware that her happiness is destroying me. It's my own fault that I didn't tell her about my feelings earlier."
"And still there seems to be something that keeps you from putting a distance between you two, one that would allow you to heal," Lucia remarked, and after thinking for a long moment, he nodded hesitantly.
"It's... It's a feeling," he admitted, his voice quiet. "Just a feeling, deep down in my stomach."
Lucia sighed and pulled him against her shoulder again, closing her eyes for a moment before she softly said: "I hope you'll act on this feeling one day, Rafi. Your intuition rarely fails you. Until then, I just want you to take a little bit more care of yourself. Promise you'll try to stop being so self-destructive."
OoO
Rafael stood in the darkness like a statue, listening to the sounds of the city; maybe this was the right moment to do it, to act on that feeling that had been itching under his skin. It had been getting stronger over the last days, and he assumed the little voice in the back of his head was right. He wanted to think that he had nothing to lose, but that wasn't true – right now, he could still see Olivia as a friend, no matter how painful it was. But if he told her about his feelings tonight, he could potentially destroy this last bit of a relationship they still had.
However, no matter how much he wished that this wouldn't happen, he knew that he needed to put an end to this, and the moment his gut feeling told him that it was right seemed to be the perfect time.
His breath was shaking and his heart was racing as he finally started moving, walking down the street, his eyes concentrated on the floor he knew her apartment was on. It felt like an eternity until he finally reached the building, and to his surprise, he was able to spot light in the windows that definitely belonged to her place.
Downing the rest of the coffee he had, he threw the two cups into the bin a few steps away and then pulled his phone out of the pocket of his jacket, nearly dropping it in the process. Rafael's fingers were trembling as he pressed number two on his speed dial, conflicted about if he wanted her to pick up or not.
"Benson?"
She sounded exhausted and oddly resigned, and he asked himself if this was really a good moment. On the other hand, it was also too late to back out.
"Hey Liv," he said, his voice sounding more insecure that he had intended it to.
"Rafael. Why are you calling so late in the night?" Her confusion was obvious in her tone, and he could understand why she felt like that.
"I... I would like to explain. I'm... chrm, I'm standing in front of your building, can I come up?"
"Uh... sure..."
OoO
Olivia put her phone down on her coffee table and ran a hand through her messy hair before grabbing a hairband and pulling it into a ponytail. She didn't bother to worry about how chaotic her living room was or how sloppy her clothes were – she simply didn't care. Right now, she was just too exhausted, both physically and emotionally, and Rafael was a friend, he would surely survive seeing her in pyjama pants and an old t-shirt.
Upon opening the door she saw that he too wasn't dressed normally – she had never thought that Rafael Barba owned jeans, let alone sneakers. He looked just as tired as she felt, and the dark shadow of a beard lay over his jawline; she had to admit that it looked incredibly handsome combined with his messy hair.
This thought only lingered in her mind for a short moment, though, before she brushed it aside, feeling like tonight really wasn't the right time to think about stuff like that. So much had happened today, and she just wanted to hear why he was here and then go to bed and sleep all the bad things away.
Rafael shrugged his jacket off and then followed her towards the couch, proud that he managed not to break his neck by slipping on Noah's toys. As they sat down, Olivia asked curiously: "So, what are you doing here at two in the morning?"
She, of course, noticed how his gaze wandered over the open bottle of wine, the photo of Tucker and her that was ripped into pieces and the heap of used tissues matching her red eyes. He'd probably already put one and two together; the way he pursed his lips for a short moment showed her that he definitely had.
"I... I wanted to talk with you," he said, sounding tentative, which puzzled her slightly – Rafael was not the kind of person that was insecure about addressing issues, he was too sharp-tongued for that. But still he sat there next to her, nearly stuttering as he spoke and seeming to search for something to occupy his hands with.
Deciding that it was best not to say anything until he'd found the right words, she looked at him in silence, taking in every single emotion that flashed over his face. Exhaustion, insecurity, doubt... she'd rarely ever see him display those, and it worried her that something seemed to distress him so much.
"There's something I've wanted to tell you for so long," Rafael continued after what seemed like an eternity, his voice quiet and soft, but also more secure than earlier. "I don't know if this is the right time at all, but I've been searching for the perfect timing before and miserably failed, so I guess it doesn't really matter anymore, as long as I do tell you."
He paused for a moment, taking a very deep breath, and she found that she was starting to get nervous. "I can't bear to be silent anymore, it seems to destroy me. I know that I'm too late, I just wanted you to know that I love you, Olivia. I've loved you for years now, and I guess the moment I saw you for the first time in the courtroom I was infatuated with you.
"You were so different from the women I'd met before, so fierce, strong, determined to give justice to those who deserved it. I was fascinated, and I still am. I didn't mean to fall in love with you, Liv. Our friendship means a lot to me, you're one of the best friends I've ever had, but I couldn't stop it, because it happened slowly."
Rafael cleared his throat; his voice had started to shake again, but he didn't seem to allow this to stop him. Olivia's head was spinning, and all she could do was stare at him and listen to what he had to say; it was as if her tongue was glued to the roof of her mouth, not a single sound escaping her.
"I didn't want to tell you after you got together with Tucker because I thought it would be selfish, seeing how happy you are with him. And if this makes you uncomfortable, I can completely understand if you don't want to be friends anymore, it's just... I can't sleep at night because I can't stop thinking of the 'what if's', and I can feel how bottling all these feelings up is making my pain only worse.
"I love you, Olivia, and I hope you can forgive me for telling you this."
Silence fell over them, and Olivia was convinced that he was able to hear her heart racing in her chest. Her head was still spinning in shock and confusion, but she could also feel how the chaos was slowly fading.
Trying to keep her hands from shaking, she looked up into his green eyes, seeing relief and fear mingle in them; it was obvious that he'd really been keeping these things to himself for a long time and that a weight had been taken off his shoulders now. She didn't really know what she was supposed to say now, so she allowed her instincts to take over.
"I guess your timing was better today," she whispered, a sad smile playing around the corners of her lips. "Tucker... we ended it."
Even though he'd definitely been able to tell that from all the evidence on her coffee table – he wasn't the best Assistant Defense Attorney of Manhattan for no reason – there was something like surprise in his expression.
It was as if she could hear the question that was shooting through his head and lingered in the air between them, and after taking a deep breath, she explained: "He... he felt like I wasn't into the relationship as much as he was, and he was right."
"I'm sorry," he mumbled, but she shook her head immediately.
"Don't be. I guess it was destined to happen from the beginning."
A lot of unsaid things hung in the air between them, coming with her statement, and Olivia wiped a tear away before it could fall onto her cheek, sniffing while trying to keep herself under control. "Love goes funny ways sometimes. Maybe a person just need to be with the wrong person before she can realise to whom her heart truly belongs."
She'd known this for quite some time now, but it was a completely different thing to say it out loud, especially in his presence. With Tucker, she hadn't needed to admit it, because her silence had been answer enough for him, causing him to grab the little clothes he'd left in her apartment and leave without another word.
For a moment, they just sat there, gazes locked, neither Olivia nor Rafael knowing what to do or say now that the cat was out of the bag and the truth was sinking in. Long ago she'd lost her hope that this conversation would ever happen, and when Tucker had entered her life, she'd thought that maybe it was time to move on. However, it had become obvious to her and also him lately that she just wasn't able to do that.
They didn't know how much time had passed until Rafael spoke again, his voice tentative. "And what are we going to do now?"
"I don't know," she whispered, but still their hands found each other on the free space of the couch between them. Their fingers joined slowly, and even though holding hands was a simple gesture, it meant a lot to them. It was a sign of coming closer, of daring to leave known territory together.
"Maybe we could see where the path is leading us?" Rafael proposed, looking up from their hands and she lost herself in his eyes for a brief moment. "Take it slow, have dinner?"
A smile lifted the corners of her mouth for the first time on this day, and she nodded, replying softly: "That would be nice."
Rafael hesitated, then he let go of her hand and gently pulled her into his arms. The warmth of his embrace made her forget the pain she'd encountered today; she buried her face in his neck and allowed her fingers to curl into the soft fabric of his sweater, breathing in his comforting scent. It felt so familiar that it didn't take long for her body to relax against his, and she closed her eyes, feeling how the hope to finally find happiness warmed her insides.
And they listened to the silence, which didn't feel so heavy anymore now that it had finally been broken.
THE END